We are the Other - Hai & Sam, Minneapolis, Minnesota (2012) I’m introducing a new concept—Neighbor Diptychs—in which neighbors who don’t know each other well are photographed in each other’s spaces. — Tip Top Haircut is two doors down from Cup Foods. I have driven past Cup Foods hundreds of times over the years, but my first time inside wasn’t until shortly after I moved into my new gallery space across the street last May. From the outside it looked like your typical corner grocery store that just stocked convenience items, but I was surprised to find a butcher shop, 60-item deli, fresh produce, great selection of food items (including Middle Eastern and Spanish ingredients), a thriving mobile phone business, and The New York Times. Samir, or Sam as he usually introduces himself, opened the store 23 years ago. He works six days a week and has 16 employees. “I care about the customers and my employees. This is my life,” he says. “It as an Islamic belief that when you’re in the womb and your heart starts ticking at 40 days, your whole life and destiny is determined at that time. Well, this is what I was meant to do.” The constant bantering of customers and the loud sports announcing from the flat screen television is momentarily silenced for the late afternoon call for prayer. After Sam’s mother passed away 14 years ago from leukemia he decided to build a mosque in her honor in the basement of the store. Cup Foods is the most visible business on a corner that has had a sketchy reputation. “The perception is getting better,” Sam says, who served five years as President for the 38th & Chicago Business Association, and is currently the treasurer. “But there is no perfect place. Even the Holy Land where I come from has the longest history of war. Things happen everywhere.”
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We are the Other - Hai & Sam, Minneapolis, Minnesota (2012)

I’m introducing a new concept—Neighbor Diptychs—in which neighbors who don’t know each other well are photographed in each other’s spaces.

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Tip Top Haircut is two doors down from Cup Foods. I have driven past Cup Foods hundreds of times over the years, but my first time inside wasn’t until shortly after I moved into my new gallery space across the street last May. From the outside it looked like your typical corner grocery store that just stocked convenience items, but I was surprised to find a butcher shop, 60-item deli, fresh produce, great selection of food items (including Middle Eastern and Spanish ingredients), a thriving mobile phone business, and The New York Times.

Samir, or Sam as he usually introduces himself, opened the store 23 years ago. He works six days a week and has 16 employees. “I care about the customers and my employees. This is my life,” he says. “It as an Islamic belief that when you’re in the womb and your heart starts ticking at 40 days, your whole life and destiny is determined at that time. Well, this is what I was meant to do.”

The constant bantering of customers and the loud sports announcing from the flat screen television is momentarily silenced for the late afternoon call for prayer. After Sam’s mother passed away 14 years ago from leukemia he decided to build a mosque in her honor in the basement of the store.

Cup Foods is the most visible business on a corner that has had a sketchy reputation. “The perception is getting better,” Sam says, who served five years as President for the 38th & Chicago Business Association, and is currently the treasurer. “But there is no perfect place. Even the Holy Land where I come from has the longest history of war. Things happen everywhere.”